Win! that is my main concern and objective, WIN! it has now become a monumental mind game, I am trying to understand if I am defeating myself, or if I am truly being outplayed in all areas of the game. Although I find it difficult to believe that when I raise preflop and end up with one caller who either re-raises me with 6-3, or 2-4 when I am holding A-K and they put all of their tournament life in jeopardy with such a superior hand piece of shit how they can continue to hit an out and beat me time after time after time.
Today I played in a guaranteed tournament on PokerStars, and made it past the first break, only to look down to Q-Q. I think we were at 150-300 blinds with an ante but honestly I can’t remember. I had almost 3000 left in chips and fired it up under the gun. I got a cold call from K-Q off suit. When the flop came K-J-J I knew that I really was an idiot to try to beat someone with a superior hand. Obviously K-Q is supposed to beat Q-Q and it did. Stuff those coin flip scenarios up your butts boys. Once every seven or eight months, I should be the monkey that prevails. I am not.
I don’t believe this is a whine – take it with a shot of tequila and hold the salt and lime if you do – it’s just a factual report of getting beat.
Here is the eternal question, am I one of the sick fucks that can’t leave the game alone and becomes more jaded with each session (just like the freaks I dealt to for years)? Why do I continue to go back? What is my goal with poker and why am I there?
I’ll admit the first 10 years or so I played, I played for fun. I really didn’t care if I won or lost, I just wanted to play poker. And in those days I won a certain percentage of the time. Now I can’t win, no matter the game, no matter the stakes, no matter how tight or how loose I play, or what I decide to do during the course of the hands. I’ve tried mixing up my play, I’ve tried sitting and waiting for a premium hand, (which would mean tighter than a bull’s butt in fly time), and I still can’t get past the heads up player that takes me out of every event. I have mainly played tournament poker, online, the last 13 months and that’s what this assessment/questioning is about.
I sometimes wonder if watching the dark side of the game from the dealer’s box has sucked the life out of my poker play. Yet…for some reason I continue to go back, believing that I can beat the game. Is that what all losers do? Always think they can still win? I often wonder when Phil Ivey was winning five gold bracelets before he was 30 if he was playing against the same players that I am that know they are at a huge disadvantage in the hand but still put all their chips in and then HIT! Or if he played against people that lost like they were supposed to with 2-4. If he was on my turf and he could still win those bracelets then all I can say is there must be something seriously wrong with my play.
Am I supposed to pitch A-K pre-flop when I’ve made it 700 to go and someone behind me raises another 900 which will put them and me both all-in? Am I supposed to throw away Q-Q every time I pick it up? These are serious questions, questions I ask myself at the end of the hand, as I click on X to close the poker table when I see 2-4 has won the pot. How can I ever win the WSOP when I can’t even get through 3000 plus in an online tournament now and then. Someone wins them. It’s never me. Is it the clowntard that so wisely played that 2-4 for all their chips that’s beating those tournaments?
Scuse me, I need a puke break.
Linda,
It is said that the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over expecting different results. I suspect that is what you are doing. Here’s how I see it: Unlike ring play, where the more highly skilled players usually wind up taking down the money pretty consistently, tournaments have a MUCH higher luck factor, since once you are busted, you can’t buy back in (and in your case, when you’ve played rebuys, you refuse to buy back in). Here’s the problem: If you have pocket aces five times in a tourney, and your opponent has any two cards, the odds say that you will lose one of those five hands. The solution, then, is simple: YOU HAVE TO MAKE SURE THAT WHEN THAT HAND HAPPENS, YOU HAVE ENOUGH CHIPS TO SURVIVE THE ALL-IN. I believe this is where your game is falling down. With the speed of an online tournament, players will be put in push monkey mode more quickly and more frequently. That’s just the way it is. The players that win the tourneys are able to exploit that situation by having more chips than their opponents and picking them off when they push. If they happen to lose the hand, they still have enough chips left to survive and try to get back in it.
The bottom line is that you are playing too tight, and, as a result, you aren’t creating a stack that can threaten anyone. As a result, players will routinely call your all-in with a hand like K-Q, thinking they have the best hand. While they are 3-1 underdog to your Q-Q, when they win, you are out. When you win, they are not. The psychology of that can’t be overlooked.
So the answer to your question is “Of course you can’t throw Q-Q or A-K away unless you have an insane read on someone”, BUT you also need to think about taking a flyer on more speculative hands that can kill an opponent when they hit earlier on in the tourneys, especially in position, where you have other options as well. From what I’ve seen of your play in our Sunday games, your natural style is not suited to online tournaments, and that is why you are consistently losing. It is simply not possible to sit back and wait for the nuts, because the odds of losing any individual hand when you are at risk will catch up with you and you will be out. I think you either need to change to a less comfortable style, or switch to ring games, where you can more easily control your risk-reward ratio.
Anyhow, that’s my two cents. BTW- Last night, I was playing a 180 player turbo, and we were down to 40. Blinds were 400-800 (ante 75), and I had about 4,500 left. Player UTG goes all-in with about 5,000 and I’ve got A-10 on the button. No one else plays, so I call, KNOWING he could have ANYTHING (as I’ve said in the past, Harrington would approve of him pushing with almost any 2). He shows J-5 offsuit. The flop comes with not one, but TWO ACES. Of course, there’s also a four, and the turn and river are a 2 and a 3 for his wheel. Approximately 60-1 against, I do believe. But the real problem was that I HAD FEWER CHIPS THAN HIM. And that’s just the way online tourneys are.
My captcha today is “Schindler”, and talk about a long shot!!!!!
Slow down there cowgirl! You’re not out there on the open range all alone. And YES! WE are not too smart for returning time and again for our lashings. I know your pain. You’re in one of those perpetual sessions where you even dread looking down to find two aces, cause baby YOU KNOW they’re going down. You just don’t know what creative little monster is going to get them THIS time.
Take a break. Take a cruise. Take an apprentice. Just don’t take no CRAP!
I, YOU, and, i’d venture to say many of your readers, feel the same pain AND we also believe that eventually the numbers will hold true. …when the pendulum swings back…blah blah blah WE’LL LIKELY BE DECAPITATED!!!!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!!! (no mas tequila por favor)
I think clearspine is…. really wrong here. There is no guarantee that you can get enough chips to protect you from someone who’s intent on donking through the tournament, and there’s no stack high enough that it will keep you safe from three or four bad hands in a row.. which happens.
The advice I’d give is threefold…. because I’ve certainly had these runs myself:
1) Resist the urge to play a billion different styles. Most pros, as much as they occasionally splash off into different ways of playing, have a certain core philosophy / style that fits how they play. It’s a style that works for them and that they can be succesful with. It’s not *all* they do, but it’s what they do most of the time. Knowing that they do it, doesn’t make them hugely beatable, it sort of adds to the image… I’m convinced that wiith very few exceptions it doesn’t help to play a game you’re not comfortable with, and it won’t change luck at all. In fact it hurts you, because it means when you do run into bad luck you’re less able to deal with it because you’re already playing in a way that makes you uncomfortable. Find *your* game, look at how you’ve played and when you’ve felt the most comfortable and had the most success… play that style and it makes it easier to have the bad luck roll off. Does being more aggressive let you get more chips early in a tourney? Maybe, but playing small ball is also an almost guarantee of making it deeper into the tourney. Lots of styles work in general, play the game that works for *you*. I’m not going to say that you should play aggressive early and then tighten up, or play tight early and then loosen up, or swing between the two extremes every few cycles… because there is no ‘bust-proof’ strategy, you’ll always be vulnerable to *some* form of bad luck, and you’ll always take it worse when you’re not playing a style you’re comfortable with.
2) Don’t be stubborn. We all know we remember the beats more than the wins, and we also have all been in the spot where we *know* without a doubt that the donk across from us just hit his runner-runner straight/flush/boat and he just jammed the pot. We *know* it, without a doubt…. so let the hand go. Don’t get so frustrated with bad luck that you make calls (or bet into) pots where you *KNOW* you’ve just gotten stabbed by Murphy. Don’t get so pissed that you make calls where you’re going to get knocked out or crippled just so you can prove how unlucky you are.=, or that the guys a donk.
3) Develop amnesia. Seriously. That guy called you down to the river with four overs on the board, and spiked a deuce to make a set and beat your top two? That really really sucked. Take 5 seconds to savor how much that sucked and then forget that hand other than making a note that SenorDonkAlot will call down with anything.
Everyone has bad runs. Everyone. Everyone has good runs too. Probability is a funny bitch, because you know that she has to follow her rules…. but the thing is she cheats. 75% vs 25% is great odds, and you’ll win three out of four…. but probability has from the beginning of time until the end of time for that to come true. So screw her, laugh in her face when she smacks you and keep playing *YOUR* game. You’ll pull ahead.
And think of it this way, maybe this bad run? Is because in three years you’ll have the best 8 days of poker in your life as your CRUSH the WSOP in a way that makes people forget Jamie Gold.
DAMN IT! ChrisW, that is exactly what I needed to hear. I know that I do know how to play poker, and I know that it has a way of eating your brain apart when you’re running bad, but I believe you just gave me some fuel that will keep me motivated and moving forward. Thank you so much.
.
And Monkey, I know you’re right there with me because I’ve dealt those damn ugly beats to you in higher limits than I play.
.
And Clearspine, I always thank you for any poker discussion you are willing to share, but in this case, I do believe you are off base with where I was coming from.
.
Thanks guys, don’t hold back on the comments, ever. 🙂